By: Daniel Vazzoler
For just the second time in the 2017-18 season, the Carleton Place Canadians left the ice at the Carleton Place Arena in defeat after Friday’s 2-1 loss to the Nepean Raiders.
Nepean has been the lone team to beat Carleton Place on home ice, beating the Canadians back on Nov. 10 in a shoot-out. Liam Souliere made the difference in the game as – once again – the Canadians ran into a hot goalie. Souliere stopped 67 of the 68 shots he faced and, while they did test him with lots of shots, the Canadians said they felt they made Souliere’s night relatively easy.
“We played a lot of the night in the (Nepean) end but we weren’t bearing down as much as we’d like to,” Canadians captain Geoff Kitt said. “Not getting to the dirty areas and jamming the puck home, making the goalie’s life pretty easy. We’ve got to fix that before playoffs and we’ll be good.
“Obviously he’s had three or four really good efforts against us, he’s a good goaltender but it comes back to getting in front of him. If he sees it, he’s going to stop it, we’ve seen that in the games we’ve played against him.”
Olivier Gauthier opened the scoring late in the first period with a power play goal for the Raiders. Gauthier got the puck along the boards and cut into the slot. His quick wrist shot beat Michael Leach high on the glove side to extend his personal goal-scoring streak to four games.
Tim Theocharidis tied the game 5:05 into the second period with a power play goal. With Carleton Place on a 5-on-3 advantage, Theocharidis set himself up along the blue-line and he one-timed the Sam Knoblauch pass past Souliere for his 17th goal of the season and his 30th goal of his career with Carleton Place.
With the game lying in the balance, Carleton Place outshot Nepean 25-1 in the third period.
But the lone Raider shot in the final frame proved to be the difference. On a night where the Canadians had little to no puck luck, Alexander Bourhas capped off a two-point game for him by scoring the game-winning goal.
Ryan Horvath missed the net with his shot attempt and the puck bounced off the end boards, off some bodies in front of the net and ended up on Bourhas’s stick with Leach forced to sprawl across the crease to attempt to make the save. Leach couldn’t get a piece of the puck as Bourhas chipped the puck into the open net to give the Raiders the lead.
Carleton Place kept the pressure on Nepean throughout the third period but couldn’t get the tying goal.
“We had a lot of shots and a lot of opportunities,” coach Jason Clarke expressed. “On any other day we may have scored five or six goals, but you’ve still got to be consistent with all parts of the game and we just weren’t consistent at the right times.
“I didn’t think we got enough pucks to the dirty areas and I thought (Souliere) was able to see everything but I thought we got better as the game went on,” Clarke added. “We weren’t consistent with it so we didn’t get the bounces we probably needed, or maybe should have gotten, with the screens and bounces in front of the net.”
The loss snapped a 14-game winning streak for the Canadians, but could be a blessing in disguise for the team with two games remaining before the playoffs start.
“I think it’s important for us to realize that we’ve got work to do,” Kitt said. “Obviously a loss is never what you want, but sometimes it’s good for the team and helps us realize, maybe we’re not where we need to be and we’ve got stuff to work on still.”
Carleton Place has two regular season games left to address the things the team says it needs to work on. The Canadians wrap up their home schedule on Sunday when the Hawkesbury Hawks visit the Carleton Place Arena before the season ends with a trip to face the Navan Grads on Friday.
